About

 Until very recently, I had assumed that I had no family connections with textiles. However, during lock down while trying to identify some photographs of my great grandmother’s family, I discovered quite by accident that her parents were the last in some three generations of handloom weavers working for the West Country woollen industry in Westbury. I had no idea of this.

I grew up in what was then a rather isolated farming village in South Warwickshire.  My mother and I lived with my grandparents who were market gardeners and fruit growers, my father had trained as a decorator and mural painter but he died during the war so I never knew him.  There were hours and days spent on the land and so from an early age, with nothing to occupy myself I took delight in looking, in touching and collecting. I remember looking intensely at the earth and what went on in it, the marks and colours of the stones, the patterns and textures of different tree barks.   When a load of gravel was delivered from a nearby quarry I was overjoyed to find tiny fossils among the pebbles.  I knew every inch of the hedgerows that divided our land from the neighbours. Most children look and make collections of things, but I carried on looking and still do, continually fascinated by minute details and textures.  

I went to Art College at sixteen, and as with most girls of my era, I was directed to the Fashion and Textiles departments.  My instincts drew me to weaving,as I could see that the technicalities it posed were potentially perfect to recreate three dimensionally the textures and marks that had somehow become so much a part of me.  Now, I question, was this child hood experience responsible for my choice of career or was it that weaving was already a part of my own ancestry?

Pat Moloney studied at Birmingham College of Art where she gained a National Diploma in Design in Woven Textiles and Ceramics. She received a post Graduate scholarship to specialise in Woven Textiles. 

She later studied Design Education at the Royal College of Art and in 1997 was awarded an MA in the History of Dress and Textiles at Winchester School of Art. 

Teaching and research:

In a teaching career that lasted over forty years, (since the 1970s), she experienced the changes that have occurred in Art and Design education witnessing first hand the history of a unique specialist college, London College of Furniture.   Its’ incorporation with the City of London Polytechnic, the transition to London Guildhall University and finally its merger with London Metropolitan University. 

In 2007 after a long and successful career teaching Woven Textiles in Higher Education in Birmingham, Winchester and London, she was appointed as a Research Fellow at London Metropolitan University where she had formerly held a teaching post as senior lecturer responsible for Textiles. Her research interests focused on the relationship between Hand Craft methodologies and Digital Design practice. 

Open College of the Arts

She played a pivotal role in the development of the Distance Learning Textile courses for the Open College of the Arts from it’s inception in 1988, writing numerous course books and as Course leader developing the BA Textile programme. 

Design and craft practice

Throughout her teaching career she has always continued with her own practice, first as a freelance designer for Industry and in later years as a Textile Artist. 

She has won a number of prizes and awards which have enabled her to travel extensively and attend overseas courses and conferences. 

As a Fellow of the Society Designer Craftsmen and a former member of Council for many years she was instrumental in coordinating the Licentiate Award scheme for new graduates at New Designers.

She is a member the European Textile Network and the Textile Society.

She exhibits regularly with the Society of Designer Craftsmen  and contributes to Studio Open Days at  the Pottery Lane Art Centre, in Notting Hill.

Pat’s work is represented on the Craft’s Council Directory and included in the following archive collections.

The V&A Fashion and Textile Collection
The Camberwell Inner London Education Authority Collection.